Trisha wren ~ Connect With Your Horse

As some of you know, I was fortunate to spend most of this year travelling in the US with, and learning from, Mark Rashid. Mark spends his time travelling from State to State – and overseas – conducting Horsemanship clinics. Out of a total of 23, we did clinics in 6 different States, plus Scotland and England, travelled through a further 10 states, and worked with over 180 horses and riders. Of those, I worked with around 130 different riders on their position and balance in the saddle, notching up over 200 such sessions! Whew.

It was interesting to note that the American clinics differ very little from the ones Mark has given over here, in terms of standard, expertise, discipline, problems presented etc. In fact the main difference was the greater variety of breeds they have over there – lots of Mustangs, Mules, Paso’s, and gaited horses like Tennessee Walkers and Missouri Foxtrotters. I did however observe several recurring themes at Mark’s clinics:

Boundaries
A large proportion of riders start off with basic groundwork, mainly leading. Common complaints are pushiness, horses pulling, walking over their handlers, nudging, nibbling, lack of attention… sound familiar?! Most of us don’t set boundaries for our horses, we don’t clearly convey to them what is acceptable and what isn’t. Often this is because we just don’t realise how important that is, or we don’t know what boundaries to set, or because we don’t want to be ‘mean’ to our horses. But horses, like children, need boundaries, they need to know exactly where they stand. Horses who have no boundaries tend to be insecure, worried, and reactive.

There are no real rules here, all you really need to do is decide what behaviour is acceptable in your horse, and be consistent about communicating that to him. By showing your horse the distance you would like him to keep when you are leading, you’ll quickly notice a change in his demeanour and attention. By being clear and consistent you will tune him in to you and get him thinking. If you have had problems leading, start with your horse say 3 feet behind you, where he can see you easily; once he’s got the idea you could go back to leading from the shoulder if that’s your preference.

If you have allowed a problem to escalate, then yes, you may well need to step up with a larger correction than you want, but if corrections are used with good timing and are fitting to the ‘breach’, you may only have to apply them a couple of times. Better to make one big decisive correction than to nag your horse with lots of little ones that he will ultimately tune out and ignore!

Look at Training Last…
Mark may well put himself (and the rest of us!) out of business with this one, but many of the horses that are brought to his clinics with ‘training’ problems are actually suffering from bad saddle fit, pain, lameness, sharp teeth, or perhaps insensitive riding. As ‘horse trainers’ we may be able to help you with a particular problem (eg canter leads) only for it to reappear the very next day – because it isn’t a training problem. So, if your horse is not responding the way you want or expect, make sure you rule out physical problems and saddle fit before calling him ‘awkward, stubborn, naughty’ etc and changing to a bigger bit and spurs to ‘make’ him do it!

Riding
There were several recurring riding problems:
• Reins too long. Many riders are so afraid of damaging their horse’s mouth that they are loath to pick up any kind of contact on their reins. This may be effective on a finished horse who has been trained to respond to the tiny signals he will then be receiving, but on a less trained horse will lead to lack of communication. It’s difficult to teach your horse to be soft, supple, rounded and responsive without some contact with the mouth. That’s not to say that you have to use heavy pressure, but you need to be consistent with what you do use and clear about the responses you are looking for. Better to have light constant pressure, than no contact most of the time then lots of pressure to get your horse, for instance, to turn. Once the horse understands the signals you are giving him you can gradually lengthen your reins if that is your goal.
• Focus. Riders complained of lack of impulsion, horses not walking in straight lines, horses heavy on the forehand…. The common reason? All of us look down at our horse’s heads! Aside from our heads being pretty heavy and therefore putting all our weight on the horse’s forehand, if we look down we are not focussed on where we are going; and if that’s the case, how is your horse supposed to know where to go and what speed to go at?! Riders experienced amazing improvements by changing this one small thing.
• Riders seat. In order for our horses to be able to perform the way we desire, our bodies need to allow them to do so – there’s no good expecting our horses to use their abs and round up their back to collect, if we are sitting there like a sack of potatoes! If we are unbalanced, it will be much harder for our horse to balance; if we ride with a hollow back then our horse probably will go the same way - your position and the way you use your body is really important. This was where I often came in, helping riders to sit more securely and evenly balanced. We also saw several ‘catch 22’ type problems. One was a rider with a bad hip, whose horse developed the same problem due to the way she was riding; she kept getting the horse ‘fixed’ by a chiropractor, but because she was still riding the same way the problem kept coming back. It may not be a bad idea to get yourself worked on every time you get your horse looked at!
• Big releases. This one often goes hand in hand with long reins – riders who give a huge release with their reins when the horse softens to their rein cue. By effectively throwing away all contact and communication (think of it like hanging up the phone in the middle of a chat to a friend) you will have to start over (redial), instead of giving a smaller rewards (perhaps just softening your hand, or relaxing one finger) which allow the conversation to continue.

Lateral Work
I saw lateral work being used over and over, to help with a variety of problems – stiffness, inverted frames, bad stops, heaviness, co-ordination, and collection for instance. This is a relatively easy way to show a horse how to use his body, and the benefits are far-reaching. The riders liked it too – a lot of them had had it drummed into them that lateral work was for advanced riders only, so were thrilled to be able to do it so easily and with obvious results.
 I still don’t think it has fully sunk in just how much I learned this year from Mark! I do feel more confident, and I know that my timing is much improved and that I am seeing much smaller tries than before. Hopefully I can use this experience to help some of you!

Trisha